Roblox was strangely unmentioned in the online bubble I was living in before having a child. I discovered it only after I started searching for child-appropriate games, and even then initially dismissed it as "some dirtily monetized Minecraft clone", but it actually predates it, and is completely different.
As you mention, Roblox is actually a huge platform for creating games in Lua, and helping other players discover them. Not only do you get a cross-platform game engine with multiplayer built in, it also seems to be quite pleasant to develop for.
For instance, you can create both client-side and server-side Lua in the same IDE, and spin up a local server with a client that connects to it in a single click with no configuration. You can also add breakpoints and step through both sides in the debugger. Pretty awesome as I was used to client-side JavaScript and server-side Python before.
Because the platform encourages experimentation, I think we'll see many new game ideas and probably even new genres emerging from Roblox.
As you mention, Roblox is actually a huge platform for creating games in Lua, and helping other players discover them. Not only do you get a cross-platform game engine with multiplayer built in, it also seems to be quite pleasant to develop for.
For instance, you can create both client-side and server-side Lua in the same IDE, and spin up a local server with a client that connects to it in a single click with no configuration. You can also add breakpoints and step through both sides in the debugger. Pretty awesome as I was used to client-side JavaScript and server-side Python before.
Because the platform encourages experimentation, I think we'll see many new game ideas and probably even new genres emerging from Roblox.